Third-party plugins provide tons of other functionality, from calculations to web searches to task management

Where It Excels

Launchy is powerful, while remaining very simple to use. Just hit Alt+Space on your keyboard to bring it up and type the name of the program you want. It will find the closest match, meaning keywords are easy to use (e.g., typing ffx brings up Firefox). It also has a lot of configuration options for tweaking how the program looks and acts, as well as lots of skins and plugins that bring a ton of other functionality to the program.

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Where It Falls Short

Launchy, while powerful, is not the most powerful program of its type. Programs like Executor have many more options, but may have some other glaring fault. Launchy provides the perfect balance between usability and features, without any glaring oversights that make it a pain to use. That said, it still can do quite a bit, especially with its plugins (though some may be a tad difficult to set up, depending on how advanced you want to make your commands).

The Competition

Executor, formerly our favorite app launcher, is probably the most powerful out there. It has a ton of system functions built in (so you can lock your computer, shut down, show IP addresses, and more with a command), and you can run multiple commands with custom keywords that are easy to make. It's big drawback is that it doesn't work well on 64-bit machines. That is, on 64-bit machines, it can only launch 32-bit programs. A few years ago, this would have affected a minority of people, but nowadays, it's a little ridiculous that the program is so behind the times. As such, we can't in good conscience recommend it as the best, though if you're still running 32-bit Windows, we recommend giving it a shot.

Keybreeze might not be as versatile in the way it finds what you're looking for, but it can do quite a bit. It doesn't do a ton more in the realm of application launching, but it does have other small features, like the ability to create sticky notes and do very basic text expansion, which is cool (but not really essential).

Find and Run Robot is one of the most powerful apps on the list, with a ton of settings, plugins, and alias capabilities that let you customize a lot of how it works. It's a bit more difficult to set up, since it's so advanced, but it's good if you have very specific needs. It's biggest downside is that it doesn't index at all, which keeps resource usage low but can be slower to find things.

SlickRun is similar to Find and Run Robot in the sense that it focuses heavily on aliases, though it's much more intuitive to set everything up and use it. What you gain in usability you sacrifice in number of features, however. We find that Launchy and Executor have a better balance.

Enso works a little differently than the others. Instead of hitting a key combo, you hold down the Caps Lock key, type in your command (i.e. "open firefox"), and release Caps Lock to activate it. You can activate it in a more traditional manner, too, but that's what really sets it apart. It seems strange, but you get used to it. You can also add aliases (called "favorites") and jump to any open program with its "go" command.

Lifehacker's App Directory is a new and growing directory of recommendations for the best applications and tools in a number of given categories.